We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
|
Remember, remember… The current government, aided & abetted fulsomely by the current opposition, are by far the greater and more extraordinary threat to our county’s health & prosperity than this very selective virus.
Remember, remember the fifth of November,
Gunpowder treason and plot.
We see no reason
Why gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot!
Oh for the good old days when treason and plot were hatched elsewhere rather than within the structure Mr. Fawkes tried to blow up.
|
Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
|
Agreed Perry. Agreed.
If we won’t wake up and pay attention, we deserve our slavery…..
As I wrote on farcebox – Let’s lock down the “government” while the rest of us get on with the job.
I realize that Labour haven’t been the party of the common man for a long time, but they could at least voice a token objection to the destruction of the working poor’s livelihood.
Renovation is needed, so…
I’m beginning to seriously wonder whether we’ll ever get out of this. Will we still be wearing masks and in lockdown in five years’ time?
Roue le Jour – the socialists are even more in favour of “lockdown” than Mr Johnson is. Almost all of the “rebels” in Parliament were CONSERVTIVES (real ones – unlike Mr Alexander Johnson and co).
Socialism has NEVER been about the rights of the “common man” – Professor Laski (Chairman of the Labour Party at is height) despised the very idea of rights as a limitation on state power, he was very much in the tradition of Thomas Cromwell, Sir Francis Bacon and his servant Thomas Hobbes, Jeremy Bentham and-so-on – absolute and unlimited STATE POWER.
Karl Marx and Frederick Engels were not “working men” and neither could really give a toss about “the working man” – they were privately what Saint-Simon had been openly, supporters of total power for an ELITE (THEMSELVES) controlling every aspect of human life, from “the cradle to the grave”,
This “common man” “Working Class” stuff was just window dressing.
As I said on another thread – those who are saying to themselves “it is not my fault – I am only obeying orders, it is Klaus Schwab and the international elite who are really to blame NOT ME!” think falsely.
You could have said “NO” Mr Alexander Johnson, and the rest of you, you did NOT have to obey. So IT IS YOUR FAULT – YOU ARE TO BLAME. No passing the buck to Klaus Schwab and the rest of the “Build Back Better” international elite.
The UK government has extended its ‘furlough scheme’ (paying 80% of wages for employees unable to work, subject to a wage ceiling) to March 2021. That means effectively a whole year of unemployment on high dole for vast numbers of people. They are clearly planning keeping the country under the ’emergency’ for at least a year. The financial and moral costs will be astronomical, the ruin of the country, deliberately, in a calculated manner, with clear regard for the consequences.
On the other hand, I’m not sure a Catholic theocracy would be better?
“That means effectively a whole year of unemployment on high dole for vast numbers of people. They are clearly planning keeping the country under the ’emergency’ for at least a year. The financial and moral costs will be astronomical, the ruin of the country”
The GDP of the UK briefly dropped to the same level it was in 2002, 18 years ago. That means that prior to 2002 the entire country was permanently ruined, by that standard. However did people live?!
@Paul Marks
Or “Building Back Better” as it’s sometimes known.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_Back_Better
I’m wondering why they chose an anagram of “Bilderberg Attic Bunk” as their slogan. Anyone know?
What’s there to disagree with in that. I’ve voted fairly frequently over the years, but my vote has rarely counted for much as I always managed to live in a secure Labour constituency, but despite all that, I will never vote Tory ever again.
Why wait five years? Stop wearing your mask now.
When you tally up the outrageous fraud that was perpetrated by the thieves over the Grenfell tower tradegy, which was only a £5m ‘hardship’ fund. Just imagine the graft and thievery that has been going on during the last nine months!
Nullius – “GDP” just measures spending.
As for 2012 – if your claim is that many millions of people were paid a lot of money for a year to NOT WORK then you are not correct.
You have become despicable person “Nullius”, no doubt there is good in you (as there is in all human beings) – but you have made a CHOICE to crush the good in yourself and follow the evil in yourself.
It would be nice if there was justice in this world – but I doubt that you will ever face justice in this world “Nullius”. However, I certainly trust that you will face justice in the next – Hell is waiting for you Sir.
No doubt you will laugh at the above – but when you face the real court of justice (and you will) you will not be laughing “Nullius”.
It is often asked why good people do not go into politics – the answer is that sometimes THEY DO.
For example, whatever people think of Donald John Trump (and someone can not spend a lifetime in business in a corrupt city like New York and be a saint), no one can seriously deny that JOHN JAMES is a good man – also everyone who has followed the contest in Michigan knows that he won the election.
But John James will not be going to the United States Senate – because he was cheated, quite blatantly so. Before Social Media started censoring videos it was possible to watch the “public servants” lock out poll watchers for the count so they could “find” however many extra votes the Democrats needed.
No doubt any British “normie” who reads this will say “just another racist like Trump” – leaving aside the “little” fact that Donald John Trump is NOT a racist, there is also the fact that John James is a BLACK MAN.
John James was the first black person to be elected to the United States Senate from Michigan – but he not be going to the United States Senate because he was CHEATED.
And “mainstream” media and the Social Media companies just laugh.
I find the figure of Guy Fawkes an interesting and educational one. On the one hand I certainly understand that visceral urge to blow up parliament and it is hard not to embrace that symbolism. But the truth is that he just wanted to replace a type of tyranny of one kind with a type of tyranny of his own kind. In those days one did not aspire to eliminating the persecution of Catholics without also aspiring to restore the persecution the protestants (or vice versa.)
It is worth noticing that right now in the United States we do have a Catholic pretender who is attempting to blow up our houses of parliament, though perhaps rather more metaphorically than Guido.
I am no great fan of democracy. Making a single mark on a ballot for someone who I may well know very little about and care even less if they get their nose in the trough, once every five years and then watching the great and good (their term, not mine) do whatever the hell they then want in power doesn’t appeal. Nor do I think that the main electoral choice, between blue socialists and red socialists, offers any interest for me.
Yet I admit thinking our pols would lament the loss of democracy given their recent actions, only to realise that really it never mattered to them in the first place. If they never really believed in the system then why should they struggle to maintain it?
I’ll second what Fraser said. The critical-theory-spouting wokerati in the US have a worldview built almost exclusively around power dynamics–an oppressor/victim system that sees the oppressed (as they define them) actively working to overthrow the power of the oppressors (defined as almost all Americans). What’s rarely discussed is that should that project succeed, the outcome is the same dynamic, with different bosses.
What a grim, soulless, pessimistic worldview those bosses would bring with them!
Well, I came up with an alternative to Democracy- I call it Meridocracy. If you chose to be a citizen, then for eleven months of the year, you should participate in some public service, such as fire-fighting, community service, road patrol, etc. For the remaining month, all who joined at the same time would get together and decide the policies and laws of their local county. Posts could be based on seniority- longest serving citizens would be eligible for mayor, etc. If all citizens are involved, then we should be able to eliminate electoral fraud. And we would all have a direct say in local laws. Counties could vote delegates to regional conventions, up to National Conventions. Whilst Switzerland is not perfect, it is an example of a Confederation that works.
“Nullius – “GDP” just measures spending.”
In a sense. “Gross domestic product (GDP) is the total monetary or market value of all the finished goods and services produced within a country’s borders in a specific time period.” To measure the total monetary market value, you have to measure what was spent on buying it, obviously. Nevertheless, the point of GDP is to try to measure the value of the goods and services produced and delivered – the real measure of wealth. It’s far from perfect as a measure, but it’s what we’ve got.
“As for 2012 – if your claim is that many millions of people were paid a lot of money for a year to NOT WORK then you are not correct.”
That’s not my claim. First, I said 2002, not 2012. Second, my claim is that the wealth produced by society steadily increases over time, in the past we were poorer than we are now, but still pretty well off. We have returned for one year to the level of poverty we experienced 18 years ago. It’s bad, but it’s not as catastrophic as you seem to imply.
Part of our problem here is that you continually misconstrue what I say or mean, and then waste your time condemning the strawman. A bigger part of the problem is that like most people you don’t understand economics, you see a small part of the picture only at a superficial level, and you fill in the gaps with your own imagined ‘reality’. Having come to a moral conclusion, this becomes immovable, and no presentation of statistics or numbers – should they disagree with the false ‘reality’ – can then shift it.
I present the numbers for those capable of seeing. I accept that some people can’t or won’t, and I’m fine with that. It’s human nature. I can’t change it, I believe everyone has a right to their beliefs, and I try not to judge.
“You have become despicable person “Nullius”, no doubt there is good in you (as there is in all human beings) – but you have made a CHOICE to crush the good in yourself and follow the evil in yourself.”
Disagreeing with you doesn’t make me evil. Just as you disagreeing with me doesn’t make you evil. “Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.” Do you believe in that? Do you understand the reasons for it?
“It would be nice if there was justice in this world – but I doubt that you will ever face justice in this world “Nullius”. However, I certainly trust that you will face justice in the next – Hell is waiting for you Sir.”
You’re not the judge of that, and it is not for you to put yourself in God’s place.
I’m not worried. If there is a judgement, I trust the judge won’t be ignorant of economics and numbers, and will understand that I was created fallible, and my motive is the honest quest for truth.
“No doubt you will laugh at the above – but when you face the real court of justice (and you will) you will not be laughing “Nullius”.”
I’m not laughing. I think it’s sad. It is our Original Sin, that we took God’s power to judge between Good and Evil, but did not in the process acquire the omniscient wisdom to apply it rightly, and so were expelled from Eden. All our wars, all our suffering, all the oppression in the world is down to people judging what is Good and Evil in others, and imposing their own vision of ‘Good’ on everyone else. The creed of the Authoritarian is that they have both the right and duty to judge between what is ‘Good’ and ‘Evil’ and impose a particular ‘Good’ way of life on everyone else, for their own good, for the good of society, and for the glory of whatever twisted vision of God they perceive. The Islamists think they serve the one true God. The Social Justice Warriors think they fight for the one true Justice. The Catholics (like Guy Fawkes) and the Protestants (like the king Fawkes plotted to blow up) both saw themselves as fighting for Good against Evil. The evil consequences of conflict and oppression arise everywhere Originally from people thinking it is within their rights to judge the good and evil in others.
Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. Isn’t that what followers of Christ believe?
Yes, it magically increases. Nothing to do with productive work. So we probably don’t even need the productive sector of the economy, let’s shut it down for a year but keep spending on the consuming sector, the mostly useless administrative sector. Brilliant!
Please, someone, take his playdough away. His models, will ruin us.
It’s not the disagreement. It the bone headed adherence to the course of action that has, is and will ruin thousands of businesses, kill hundreds of thousands – as your hero Neil Fergusson ( this one ) said in his presentation to our useless Parliament, we* will be paying for this year for decades to come. You must know by now, it is the wrong path. Destruction of the economy for adherence to ideological purposes, that’s the path Stalin took, the path Mao Zedong chose. It’s interesting to see, in the West we are experiencing a sort of ‘cultural revolution’, right here, right now.
Perhaps you’d like to put forward the case that Mao and Stalin weren’t evil.
*when he said ‘we’ he meant you, the population at large, not the civil service, nor the Parliamentarians.
“Yes, it magically increases. Nothing to do with productive work.”
Strawman!